All about fly-fishing for Steelhead, Salmon, trout on Vancouver Island BC. Best Flies to use for Steelhead, Salmon & trout, technics for catching Steelhead, Salmon & trout in rivers and saltwater beaches.

About Single Spey Flyfishing

Followed my passions over the years for better or worst... Have had the Steelhead bug now for 28yrs. I have played drums professionally for several years, grew up on rock & roll. Being a Flyfishing Guide for 15 yrs on the coast of BC has given me a lot of experience and a broad knowledge for approaching Salmon & Steelhead fishing with a fly! I have owned a couple of lodges in BC, one called Spey Lodge with the more recent addition being Boundary Lodge. In the past 4 years I have been back on Vancouver Island starting up a flyfishing Guide service based on the banks of the Campbell river, just a few properties upstream from the famous Roderick Haig Brown heritage property. This is where my family and I are currently enjoying our lives on the coast of BC.

Thanks for viewing my first blog. For more info about my guide service view www.bcflyguide.com or if you have questions about flyfishing Vancouver Island in general please feel free to ask. This site's all about Flyfishing Vancouver Island with some great pictures from guided & personal fishing trips, new flies I'm tying, whats new & all that other good stuff related to casting a fly on island waters! Flyfishing, guiding and my passion for this sport is always growing. I hope this blog will assist those of you in keeping up on what I'm up to here, and why I think Vancouver Island BC is so under rated for it's Flyfishing opportunities. Thanks for visiting and come again, regards.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Vancouver Island / Spring Steelhead April 26th / 11

April Showers bring all the colors of the rainbow including Chrome?
Yesterday we spent the day floating the river with your typical spring weather, 5 minutes of rain, then sun, then wind from the south, then.. It certainly felt like spring time and of course the smell of skunk cabbage in the air makes myself think of all those fresh chrome surprises I've had and talked about to clients for many years...
We get fresh Steelhead arriving even into late May; over the last few years it's seemed clear that the runs of Steelhead I've known on Vancouver Island aren't in numbers in the later season as much much as they are earlier in Winter months. Now this has always been true to some extent that the earlier runs of fish are stronger in numbers but some watersheds used to bring a strong push of fish late April / May that just don't seem to be evident like they used to.
Years ago the elders I fished with talked about the numbers of late fish that staged and spawned in the lower reaches of the watersheds at one time, and in good numbers. Those fish don't seem to be around anymore and after considering all the scenarios I still don't have a convincing answer as to why... Was it due to colder water temps, ever changing river conditions due to environmental changes in the watershed or is it ocean conditions making them arrive to the watersheds earlier in the season for some unknown reason...
This year we've had colder water temps throughout the winter season and I personally have been anticipating a possible return of late Steelhead in good numbers. One can dream of the good old days and when I think of all the days I've experienced these hot fish on warm spring days with the scents of Skunk Cabbage lingering in the air, the more I can't forget how awesome Spring Steelhead fishing is... The days are longer, everything is vibrant including the weather, the elk are thriving in the river valley and occasionally just when you thought your Winter / Spring Steelhead season is over that awesome chromer takes hold and tears the pool apart!

Yesterday was interesting as we floated 10kms of river to ourselves, everything seemed right accept the fish just weren't on the bite, not even a trout... Keeping that steelheading spirit we just kept pounding as we knew this could change at any pool. When fishing in spring you can get a mixed bag of opportunities from fish that are dropping out to that new arrival who thinks its the master of its domain; letting anything that swims by know who's in charge! We arrived to this long run that could be fished for half a day and I defined where I've had most of my success in past seasons on it. We focused on making every cast count in this section to the point of even re-rigging our line setup and it payed big! Changing the line and fly got us the distance we needed to cover the far bank confidently! the result was three takes, two hook ups and one landed which turned out to be that late arriving hen we had just dreamed of hooking up minutes prior! Some wishes do come true!! :) you can view this fish on video while the weather changed before our eyes at the link below http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFwwkdQEIXQ&feature=youtube_gdata_player